Does anyone know about merchant credit card services for internet websites? (1 Viewer)

[ken thompson]

My brother-in-law is doing some consulting for a Taiwanese company that runs a website similar to an e-bay concept. They are looking into merchant credit card services and are wondering who to contact. Does anyone have any advice?

 

[Jeff Ulmer]

That would depend on whether they want to do the transactions themselves or if they are looking for a third party to do the transaction. Since Ebay just bought PayPal, they could try contacting BillPoint for third party services.

 

[Daniel Swartz]

If you truly want a merchant account, and not simply a PayPal one, you can checkout Wells Fargo and Cardservice International. Your rates will be extremely high though and you will be forced to assume all liability with respect to fraud and chargebacks. Once you build up sufficient transaction volume, you might be able to renegotiate a better rate and better terms. You also might be able to get a larger/more reputable bank to issue you a merchant account. This is a very tricky subject for online merchants and one where the banks hold all of the cards.

 

[JasonKrol]

depending on how much money there is to be spent/invested and if the website is being housed on its own in-house server etc, VeriSign is the way to go. They do encryption and automatic creditcard processing, but at a hefty price. Most internet ecommerce websites use them in some form or another. I work for a publication company and we have multiple websites, one of which is an ecommerce website (kinda). We used VeriSign and they encrypt the server so people can enter secure information and get the little lock symbol in their browser, and they also provide a service where they can do automatic credit card processing and transfer the fund directly to an account (but, I think that account needs to be setup with someone else, like a bank etc, and have the infamous merchant status turned on or whatever so it will accept direct deposits of income from automatic sources like VeriSign etc.)

basically, there is a TON of research to do in order to get this stuff understood. Good luck!!

 

[Jeff Ulmer]

If they are doing an auction site, chances are they aren't going to want their own merchant account, but rather a service which allows the participants to pay each other, like PayPal or BillPoint. Since PayPal is now owned by Ebay, I doubt they will be used for competing businesses (auction sites), so an alliance with someone like BillPoint would be what I would suggest as a starting point.

 

[Daniel Swartz]

To elaborate on what Jason mentioned, a merchant account is only part of the process. You will also need a valid "certificate" that authenticates you to users. Verisign is by far the market leader here and they also own their former closest competitor (Thawte). However, I believe that Thawte's rates are still cheaper and they provide the exact same functionality.